Obama hails Mandela as personal hero

Pretoria - United States President Barack Obama flies to South Africa on Friday hoping to pay homage to the legacy of his critically ill hero, Nelson Mandela, who is fighting for his life in hospital.

Mandela's ill health means the two men, who shattered racial boundaries on either side of the Atlantic, are not expected to have a long-anticipated meeting for the cameras.

Still, reflections on Mandela's extraordinary journey from prisoner to president are likely to permeate Obama's three-day stay.

Mandela, who turns 95 next month, was rushed to hospital three weeks ago with a recurrent lung disease.

On the eve of the visit, Mandela was said to be in a critical condition, but had stabilised since a scare forced President Jacob Zuma to cancel a trip to neighbouring Mozambique.

“He is much better today,” Zuma said after seeing Mandela on Thursday for the second time in less than 24 hours.

Yet South Africans, including Mandela's family, remain prepared for the worst.

“I won't lie. It doesn't look good,” daughter Makaziwe Mandela said. But “if we speak to him he responds and tries to open his eyes - he’s still there”.

“Anything is imminent, but I want to emphasise again that it is only God who knows when the time to go is,” she told local radio.

Meanwhile Obama, America’s first black president, led a chorus of support for the man he dubbed a “hero for the world”.

Mandela's plight has lent a deeply poignant tone to the visit, around which Obama has built a three-nation Africa tour, and his plans could yet be upended by sudden developments in Madiba’s condition.

“The president will be speaking to the legacy of Nelson Mandela and that will be a significant part of our time in South Africa,” said deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes.

“The president will treasure any opportunity he has to celebrate that legacy.”

The White House says it is in the hands of the Mandela family and the South African authorities on any aspect of the visit.

“We will obviously be very deferential to the developments that take place and the wishes of the family and the South African government,” Rhodes said.

A visit by Obama to Mandela's former jail cell on Robben Island, off Cape Town, on Sunday would now take on extra “profundity”, he added.

Speaking in Senegal on the first leg of his long-awaited African trip, Obama described Mandela as “a personal hero”.

“I think he is a hero for the world, and if and when he passes from this place, one thing I think we all know is that his legacy is one that will linger on throughout the ages.”

The US president recalled how Mandela had inspired him to take up political activity, when he campaigned for the anti-apartheid movement as a student in the late 1970s.

Outside the Mediclinic Heart Hospital where Mandela is being treated, a wall of messages and flowers has become the focal point for a nation saying a long goodbye to one of the greatest figures of the 20th century.

“There is no sadness here. There is celebration. He is a giant,” said Nomhlahla Donry, 57, whose husband served time with the revered leader.

Mandela has been in hospital four times since December, mostly for a stubborn lung infection.

The man once branded a terrorist by the United States and Britain walked free from prison near Cape Town in 1990.

He went on to negotiate an end to white minority rule and won South Africa's first fully democratic elections in 1994.

He forged a path of racial reconciliation during his single term as president, before taking up a new role as a roving elder statesman and leading Aids campaigner.

He stepped back from public life in 2004 and has not been seen in public since the football World Cup final in South Africa in 2010.

But Mandela still draws vast global interest - interest which now appears to be wearing on his family.